Fantastic video Few questions: Is there any difference if an enemy attacks you and the PC is holding a melee/ranged weapon (or is not holding any weapon at all)?In the video the PC was disarmed... does the weapon drop to the ground or into the inventory (I assume it is the inventory)?How many AP does changing the weapon consume? Do all of them consume the same amount or are they differentiated?And lastly... is there any info on the weapons (properties, damage etc.)?

Is there any difference if an enemy attacks you and the PC is holding a melee/ranged weapon (or is not holding any weapon at all)?

None whatsoever.

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In the video the PC was disarmed... does the weapon drop to the ground or into the inventory (I assume it is the inventory)?

Drops on the ground. You can pick it up if you want to. We don't do pixel-hunting, so you click a button and see all available items. Makes it easier to collect loot after battles. It's similar to Realms of Arkania system, if you're wondering.

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How many AP does changing the weapon consume? Do all of them consume the same amount or are they differentiated?

It takes 4AP to open your inventory. You can stay there as long as you like at no additional cost.

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And lastly... is there any info on the weapons (properties, damage etc.)?

Yes, of course. First, you see all the info in the weapon box (see the picture below, where the crossbow is):

Drops on the ground. You can pick it up if you want to. We don't do pixel-hunting, so you click a button and see all available items. Makes it easier to collect loot after battles. It's similar to Realms of Arkania system, if you're wondering.

Wait, you once said that when the PC (or NPCs) was desarmed, the weapon would drop to the ground and you'd see a treasure chest (or was it a loot bag a la NWN?) so you could actually pick the weapon DURING the battle...

Nah. The hands are just abstract. The active weapon always appears in the right hand as far as I can tell, you just can't hold more than two one-handed or one two-handed weapon.

Oh, and some more critical statements to the video:

In the current version you don't see much of interest. I mean, the models look good, as do the environment and the poses of the guards. But the melee attacks in the video are all a short stab, weapon hand moves an inch forward, back, done.Also, there has always been something wrong about the crossbow shots, in the previous video already, I just couldn't quite put my finger on it.For one thing, the bolt's "trail" is too large and bright. It ought to be more subtle. As it is it completely trumps the actual bolt. But the real issue is how casual the animation looks. If the crossbow is to appear as a powerful "shotgun" you should be able to feel the force of the shot. The weapon ought to jerk backwards, maybe even rock the entire body of the shooter.

Drops on the ground. You can pick it up if you want to. We don't do pixel-hunting, so you click a button and see all available items. Makes it easier to collect loot after battles. It's similar to Realms of Arkania system, if you're wondering.

Wait, you once said that when the PC (or NPCs) was desarmed, the weapon would drop to the ground and you'd see a treasure chest (or was it a loot bag a la NWN?) so you could actually pick the weapon DURING the battle...

I assume you're referring to this post:

"Our general pick-up system is simple. You click on the eye icon* and get a window that shows you all available (not in containers) items in each map(!). We have, basically, an invisible container where all the local junk is contained and dropped into when you discard an item or kill someone. Since we don't have a lot of junk lying around that seems to work well. All ingredients (leafs, sulfur, etc) are also in the container (different areas have different items - there are no leafs in desert locations, obviously). The access to the ingredients is skill-based. Let's say there are 40 "healing" leafs in an area. If your alchemy is 50, you only see 8 leafs in the pickup box. You can't see any items, weapons or ingredients, on the ground; everything is handled via the pickup window.

Anyway, moving on. In combat your can't access the general pickup window. Some battles involve allies and smarter testers waited for a better equipped characters to die and then grabbed their stuff telekinetically, being 5-10 squares away. That didn't work for us, so we had to change it. You can pick up only what's on the square you stand on (think XCOM). That way if you see a dropped weapon and you want it NOW!, you move your ass to that square and pick it up. Alternatively, you can wait for the battle to be over and then pick up everything through the general pickup window.

Now, that seems to work, but you can't see items that are on the ground, which creates a problem. Yesterday my character was disarmed by NPC A and then was knocked away by NPC B's hammer of painful death. So, here I was, disarmed and far away from the square with my axe. What was worse I couldn't even remember which square it was after the NPCs moved a bit. So, we decided to use the NWN2 "lootbag" system, which I hate with passion. We wasted a few weeks trying to come up with a better system and trying different things, but failed. Well, we'd have stupid little chests instead of bags. After a battle is over, the chests will disappear and all the loot will go into the main invisible chest. So, that's the kinda stuff that we are dealing with at the moment, in case someone's wondering."

Umm... pixel hunting a la BG wasn't that bad when alt highlights everything lootable. The biggest issue the stacks sitting on top of each other and having to root through each one. Could you have the model of the biggest item dropped visible on that square, but when you loot it all items on that tile are visible in the loot window?

For example, you drop a scroll and a little misc. lore loot icon shows on the ground. You drop a short sword and then that is all you see. You drop a two handed axe and that's all you see. You drop another sword, but still only see the axe. You click the axe and you can pick up the axe 2 swords and/or the scroll.

You should rethink your items-are-invisible-on-ground concept. It's quite surprising when im standing in an empty room, click the eye icon and suddenly 10 items are around me to pick up.. this could lead to some strange situations. Also, it's not exactly a difficult task to create those items since you already have all the models done.

I think you overvalue the need to avoid pixel hunting, it's no problem as long as there is a key that highlights all items on ground and it also makes the envoirment look way better, adds to the art and is more intuitive this way. It's just wrong to stand in the middle of a big treasure pile that is actually invisible on the screen. If i'm mistaken and for some reason it is a diffucult task to put the items on ground, feel free to ignore my post.

The pixel hunting is one of the worst bits in Arcanum, precisely because there was not anything (as far as I know) to highlight things, so if I was disarmed in a fight I then had to spend ages searching around for my weapon. This was particularly irksome in the Tarant sewers.

Logged

"By striving to do the impossible, man has always achieved what is possible. Those who have cautiously done no more than they believed possible have never taken a single step forward." --Mikhail Bakunin

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In the current version you don't see much of interest. I mean, the models look good, as do the environment and the poses of the guards. But the melee attacks in the video are all a short stab, weapon hand moves an inch forward, back, done.Also, there has always been something wrong about the crossbow shots, in the previous video already, I just couldn't quite put my finger on it.For one thing, the bolt's "trail" is too large and bright. It ought to be more subtle. As it is it completely trumps the actual bolt. But the real issue is how casual the animation looks. If the crossbow is to appear as a powerful "shotgun" you should be able to feel the force of the shot. The weapon ought to jerk backwards, maybe even rock the entire body of the shooter.

No arguing here. The animations aren't exciting enough, but we have no time to re-do them. Overall, the video shows gameplay: the animations, the combat system, how everything works, the backgrounds (the palace looks great, btw), etc. It gives you a good idea of what playing the game would feel like.

You should rethink your items-are-invisible-on-ground concept. It's quite surprising when im standing in an empty room, click the eye icon and suddenly 10 items are around me to pick up.. this could lead to some strange situations. Also, it's not exactly a difficult task to create those items since you already have all the models done.